January 24, 2012; Unnamed sound off Isla Whittlebury, in Bahia San Jorge, west of Isla Hoste, approximately 55º16′S, 70º00′W

Before retiring for the evening last night I talked with the captain and told him that ideally tomorrow, we would like to get to one of the more exposed southern islands, Isla Waterman, and that he would have to decide–based on weather and sea conditions–if it would be possible in the morning. As a backup, I told him we would be quite happy collecting on Isla Whittlebury, off of which we were anchored for the night. This morning the engines started at 7 a.m., and almost everyone just stayed in their bunks for the ride. Because we were moving for about an hour, and we hit rough seas for about 20 minutes on the way (while crossing Seno Christmas), I realized that we would soon be arriving at our first choice, Isla Waterman.

Isla Waterman

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Meet Doug Tallamy, an expert on the importance of native plants in our landscape and how to care for them — Thursday, February 16, 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Photo courtesy of Lisa Mattei.

Doug Tallamy knows how important a diverse native plant community is for other living creatures, especially insects. He has devoted much of his career to understanding the many ways insects interact with plants, creating essential food webs without which our ecosystems would fail.

His award-winning book and website, Bringing Nature Home, is a call to action for gardeners across the country to use native plants to sustain wildlife, promote biodiversity, and protect our ecosystems.

In his book, Tallamy recounts his own “epiphany” when his family moved to 10 acres in southeastern Pennsylvania, an area “farmed for centuries before being subdivided and sold.” He discovered that “at least 35% of the vegetation on our property consisted of aggressive plant species from other continents that were rapidly replacing what native plants we did have.” And he noticed something else: the alien plants on the property, such as the Norway maples and the mile-a-minute weeds, had “very little or no leaf damage from insects.”
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You don’t actually need to bushwhack your way through the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory. If that were the case, we probably wouldn’t be holding salsa classes there.

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen